A Class Divided Summary

“A Question of Class” focuses on Dorothy Allison’s struggle of identifying herself as a poverty stricken individual, and breaking free from her predetermined destiny while simultaneously accepting her past. Allison understands the prejudice that comes with being poor with the statement, “I have learned with great difficulty that the vast majority of people pretend that poverty is a voluntary condition, that the poor are…less than fully human…” The quote fundamentally means that society does not view the poor as their equivalents to the world, and one chooses to live in such conditions. Although the remark was made in the 1950’s, it still rings true in the societal ideology of present time. Changes have not been

On the first day of the experiment, the blue-eyed children, or the in-group, were told they were superior to the brown eyed children, the out-group. On top of being told they were better and smarter than the brown-eyed children, the out-group was not allowed to drink from the same fountain, play together at recess, or go back for seconds at lunch-time. The brown eyed children received less recess time, had to wait to go to lunch, and wore collars for easy recognition.

In a powerful experiment we were able to see through the eyes of a kindergarten children prejudice dynamics. In a famous experience by Jane Elliot she separated her class between blue-eyed and brown-eyed students. Professor Elliot had separated her students by making one eye group inferior to the other making them have certain benefits and better treatment than the other group of students. Eventually, the students were switched the following day. This experiment have showed this group of kindergarten students how colors and discrimination affected the minority population. After this successful experiment with the kindergarten student’s professor Jane Elliot had done many other experiments using adults using the a similar technique blue-eyed

In watching the video Jane Elliot specifically separated the class by eye color Blue eyed meaning that you were better smarter and appreciated more in society and brown eyed meaning you were less than, not a good person, and not as smart as a blue-eyed person. And one of students was subjective to that because one his parents was brown eyed and he didn't quite understand why was his dad being labeled as less because of his eye color. The kids quickly recognized that brown eyed people were labeled as bad people and people who are flat out bad. One of the students who was labeled as brown eye immediately felt the treatment of not be treated equally and being put down based upon his eye color.

Elliott gave an excellent example of prejudice and discrimination to her 3rd grade pupils. She split her class in two groups according to their eye color. She set up the rules since the beginning, where the blue eyes group was superior to the brown eyes group and uses a color collar to make the inferior team more visible. It is heartbreaking to see little kids discriminating against each other within that little time and being mean to their friends. Also we see that the kids who were appraised performed better on their tests and work in general. Elliott repeated the exercise to the employees of the Iowa prison system. The reaction to the employees was similar to the 3rd grade kids. They started to prejudice and discriminate

Racism is being explored in the short video. Racial inequality has been introduced by Ms Jane Elliott through prejudice and discrimination that held against people who have different skin colour beside white in this society. Racial categorization is the process of categorizing people into different groups according to phenotypic physical features of the face and body such as skin colour, eyes colour or lip fullness (Keith, 2006). One frequently hears words ending in “ism” – such as racism, sexism, ageism and so forth are used to describe specific targets of prejudice and discrimination (Bernard & Mary, 2010). In the video, racial stereotype, prejudice and discrimination is being exercised. Students were divided into two groups which are represented by their eye colour where blue-eyed representing white people and brown-eyed representing non-white people. Brown-eyed students were designated the “superior” group and the blue-eyed students were designated the “inferior” group. The brown-eyed students were encouraged to discriminate against the blue-eyed students by convincing that they were smarter, cleaner, better, and more civilized.

She wanted to give each student a clear understating how it feels on both sides of the pole. The students immediately turned on their friends, both days, when they were told one eye color group was better than the other. Eliot’s experiment showed how kids are taught racism and how it only took 24hours. She gave them pre-test and post-test that showed that on the days the students with the superior eye color were treated better they scored higher while the secondary students tested poorly. The results were the same for both days. According to Matthew E. Lemberger and Tamiko Lemberger-Truelove, authors of Using the Transcultural Adlerian Conceptualization and Therapy (TACT) Model to Depict the Influence of Race-Based Trauma (2016) they agree with Courtney Heldreth et al., University of California, Los Angeles (2016), on their point that racism causes medical and mental issues on person wellbeing. Lemberger and True-lover notes racism can be seen as traumatic for a person and their growth (Lemberger and True-love, 2016 p.3) whereas Courtney Heldreth et al. claims that postpartum depression symptoms were partially mediated by everyday experience with racism (Heldreth et al, 2016 p.3).

She told her students that the blue-eyed students were superior to their brown-eyed friends. Within minutes, the way the two groups of students acted towards one another changed. Ms. Elliot, their teacher, started calling the blue-eyed division of the group “better and smarter” than their brown-eyed equivalents. She continued this by giving them more opportunities than the brown-eyed students. For example, they recieved seconds at lunch, as well as, extra time at recess. A blue-eyed student also went on to say, “You better keep the art stick close, [Ms. Elliot] in case you need to use it.” He meant to use it to punish a brown-eyed classmate. Once the teacher changed her views, the students did too. The students did not want to be different, so they followed their leader's example. Even though this part of the experiment only took place for a day, it seemed like it had occurred for a while. This is a great example of how once a leader changes his/her point of view, it’s followers will do the same, so they will not be seen as different or an

I agree with Jane Elliott’s teaching and learning methods. Her way of teaching is unarguably harsh, but the lesson she tries to bring forth is extremely meaningful. The best way to teach and understanding and respect for people who are different is to put them in situations where they will be affected. I recognize that society tries to teach equality through movies, books, and historical events, but these aren’t enough efforts to cease racism and sexism. I thought it was a meaningful experiment for these participants to undergo this for a couple of hours, because they actually felt the same intimidation and fear that colored people feel every single day. The participants definitely left the classroom aware of the struggles non-white people have to

A Class Divided is about a 3rd grade class and their teacher. The teacher is passionately against racism and wants to inspire change. The day after Martin Luther King Jr. died she has the courage to start. She introduces the idea that blue-eyed people are better to her 3rd grade class and spends the whole day reinforcing that mindset. She gives biased examples of why the blue-eyed children are better, pointing out every mistake a brown-eyed child makes. She makes rules for the brown-eyed children to follow, telling them they can’t get seconds at lunch, play with the blued eyed children, or use the water fountain. She even goes so far as to give them collars to wear so that they are distinguished from a distance. The children follow along without

This documentary was about how it feels to be discriminated upon and how it can be influenced in small children easily. Discrimination creates a barrier in the mind. For this reason, the barriers created by the prejudice are hard to overcome. In light to this, Elliott segregates her class according to eye color whereby brown eyes are perceived to be superior to the blue-eyed people. On the first day, the brown eyed pupils were provided with privileges (A Class Divided). They were allowed to have help at lunch, extra time at recess and a sense of self-worth above the blue eyed students. However, on the On the following day (not next) the situation is reversed and the blue eyed pupils are indulged with privilege which results to making brown eyed pupils feel less special compared with their peers. Elliott takes the opportunity to observe her class turning into a microcosm of society. Surprisingly, every time the experiment was carried out, the preferred group quickly turned the tables and embraced elite status. This implies that the two groups readily adopted the propaganda that Elliott sprouted on them (A Class Divided). The two created groups readily adopted their roles to perfection.

I was very surprised that the children worked so well with the experiment. They got into it and took it as real. I was also surprised that the children in the “liked” group did better on flashcards then the children who were being discriminated against. I remembered the scenes that showed the children’s faces the most. The children looked so traumatized when Mrs. Elliot discriminated against them. They took it so personally, even though in the end, it was only just an experiment. I also remembered how the children interacted with each other when they where being discriminated against. They would call each other names and bicker between the two groups, the brown eyed and the blue eyed children. There was one incident where one of the children made fun of another for not being the accepted and liked group.

“A Class Divided” video demonstrated prejudice to young children based on the color of their eyes and how this is related to the unfairness of racism. The teacher took ribbons and tied them around the neck of a certain eye color group for a day and treated them differently. It demonstrated to the children that they cannot choose what eye color they have and they got very upset that they were being treated poorly and their friends with a different eye color were not. This in conjunction with how a person of color doesn’t get to determine their skin color but still are treated solely on the color of their skin.

The video was a very effective introduction to the experiences of prejudice. Jane Elliot's approach allowed the students, who had been friends, to put each other into a category. The children began to turn on one another because of their eye color and in the long run this resulted in one child hitting another, bad attitudes, and hurt feelings. Once the experiment was over the children and adults had realized that discrimmination is real and it can affect every aspect of someones life.

Jane Elliot, a third grade teacher, taught her class about discrimination in a unique way. She separated them into two groups: blue eyes and brown eyes. When the blue eyed children was superior, they began to discriminate against the brown eyed children. However when the tables where turned you would think the ones whom was getting picked on would be understanding of how hurtful power can be towards the inferior people, but they acted the same way as the ones who was calling them names when they was the inferior group.